


Promise

by Pointeofdance



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebels, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Episode: s02e21-22 Twilight of the Apprentice, Fix-It, Gen, I NEED HAPPINESS FOR THEM, I am broken after clone wars, So I fixed things;), alternative ending, send help
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-15
Updated: 2020-05-15
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:15:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24196534
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pointeofdance/pseuds/Pointeofdance
Summary: The ending to Ahsoka and Vader's fight in the Rebels episode Twilight of the Apprentice needed fixing. So I fixed it. Now with a happy(-er? it's a bit ambiguous) ending! Basically, these two need to admit they're important to each other and stop fighting.You don't need to watch Rebels to understand this. Youtube "Ahsoka vs Vader" and the scene will pop up. I watched the scene without seeing the show first and I can absolutely guarantee you'll be fine.
Relationships: Ahsoka Tano & Darth Vader, Anakin Skywalker & Ahsoka Tano
Comments: 10
Kudos: 69





	Promise

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! Welcome to my 3am writing binge because these two will not get out of my head. The ending of clone wars broke me and as I'm finally done with my undergraduate degree and Disney plus is now a thing, I've been binging Rebels for the first time as well. All in all, not a great combo for all the Ahsoka and Anakin feels which is where this story spawned from. 
> 
> Like I said in the summary, you don't need to have watched Rebels, but I would STRONGLY recommend watching the fight clip because I didn't rewrite the beginning of the scene. This starts where Ahsoka breaks his helmet.
> 
> Enjoy!

“Ahsoka,” his voice rasped. Her eyes widened as she heard the labored breathing behind her even as her heart shattered. She turned around to face the man she knew she could no longer deny.

“Ahsoka,” he repeated. Through the part of the mask she had severed during her leap, she could see a single eye. The yellow, sithly color sickened her as she knew the bright blue they once were. 

“Anakin,” she breathed, and she felt her heart shatter again, as if finally admitting it outloud was admitting it to herself. She could no longer hide from the truth that she had been running from for the better part of a year, since the first mental contact she had made with the being known as Darth Vader while on the Ghost with Kanan.

Her mind flashed back to the last time she had seen her master. She was filled with guilt at her brusk treatment of him as she was so concerned with helping Mandalore and capturing Maul. She longed with all her heart to go back to that day and talk with him. There was some part of her mind that would always question if she could have done something to prevent his fall. If she had been there, maybe something would have turned out differently. Well, she couldn’t change the past, but she would not fail him again.

“I won’t leave you,” she cried. “Not this time.”

She waited with baited breath for his answer. The air was permeated with the sound of his wheezing, assisted breathing amid the rumbling of the collapsing temple surrounding them. It felt like an eternity as they stood there staring at each other, her violet eyes not breaking contact with his yellow. She could see the hardness and the pain. She thought she saw a flash of guilt, but feeling his dark presence, she thought she must be mistaken. Sith did not feel guilt. However, when his eyes flashed blue, she knew she was not.

“But you will.” Her master’s voice cracked. “Everybody does.”

He relit his red lightsaber, although it still hung loosely at his side. Behind her, she heard Ezra call her name and felt him run towards her. Without breaking eye contact with Vader, she thrust a hand behind her and force pushed him outside of the temple. With her concentration fully on Vader, she held out her two lightsabers in front of her. She opened her hands and let them clatter to the floor, rolling away.

“Never,” she declared, her voice ringing with her confidence. She knelt on the ground and looked up at his towering form. “And if you want me to leave, you will have to kill me like this. A willing sacrifice.”

Vader looked at her calculatingly. “I will not kill you unarmed.”

“Why not?” she challenged. A small part of her mind wondered if it was smart challenging a sith lord while unarmed and on her knees, but she could not do any different. She would not fight her master. “You have murdered so many others who were unarmed.”

She was nearly blown back by the wave of anger she felt through the force. Never had she felt such a strong emotion from a force sensitive. Not even the rage of Maul, the coldness of Count Dooku, the anger of Ventress, or the twisted pleasure in pain of the inquisitors could compare.

“Pick up your weapon,” Vader’s mechanized voice rumbled.

“No, I will not fight you, Master,” she glared defiantly. A line occurred to her. It would likely be the stupidest thing she had said yet, but she wasn’t sure how her situation could get any worse. She was expecting the killing blow at any moment and one last quip at her old master would likely just quicken the ending. “You’re stuck with me, Skyguy.”

The eye that she could see widened and flashed blue for a few seconds, longer than the first time. Vader stumbled backwards onto his knees, his lightsaber deactivating. His head was bent down so she could no longer see the emotion in his eye. However, she could feel it swirling all around her in the force. Anger, sadness, pain, fear, confusion. Most prominent of all: guilt. She waited for him to say something, anything, the rumbling of the temple continuing to collapse an ominous reminder of their limited time.

“Go,” he finally muttered.

“Master?” she questioned, not able to believe the word that had come out of his helmet.

“Leave!” he roared, standing back up and facing her. His eye was yellow again, but she could still feel his conflicting emotions through the force, although anger was beginning to prevail. “I thought you were dead once. Do not make me ensure it now.”

Ahsoka slowly collected her lightsabers and stood up. She met his eyes. “I will not leave you, Master.”

“You are a fool,” he growled. “Go return to your rebel friends and the would-be jedi. They do not have long to survive, I assure you. I do not have to be the one to strike the killing blow.”

“What will your master say as you can’t kill me now?” Ahsoka asked. A part of her wanted to run and save her own skin. Live to fight for the rebels another day. However, a larger part of her wanted, no,  _ needed _ , to stay with Vader.

That was clearly the wrong thing to say as the swirling storm of force emotions reached a peak. Vader howled and the storm burst out in a force push with him at the center. She was buffeted, but surprisingly unharmed. She knew she must have been shielded on some level because she could see the strength of the actual force wave on the temple around her. More cracks and fractures were appearing in the walls and columns. The whole temple was going to collapse on top of them soon if they did not escape. “I WILL NOT LOSE YOU, TOO.”

As suddenly as the storm came, it dissipated, leaving Vader on his knees, panting, in the center of the room. His breathing, already difficult due to the malfunction she had caused by damaging his mask, was worsening. She could hear the short, hyperventilating-like breaths that were making their way through the respirator. The damage she had caused must have been more severe than she had realized. She scrambled to her feet and over to her master.

“Vader?” she questioned cautiously, a hand reaching out for his shoulder. 

“I have to… My ship,” came the broken voice. With the voice modulator malfunctioning, she was beginning to hear her master’s old voice, although she could tell something wasn’t right. She could not dwell at this time at what could have caused him to badly damage his lungs enough to need a respirator nor what was the need for the full body suit. She carefully put one of his arms over her shoulder and the other around his back. She hauled him up carefully until they were both in a standing position. He leaned heavily upon her and she struggled slightly under his weight. She was exhausted from the many duels that she had had today. As she helped Vader slowly out of the temple, she reflected that she had never fought so many darksiders in one day, let alone the couple hours where she had dueled multiple inquisitors, Maul, and Vader himself. It was a wonder she was still on her feet, let alone able to assist her ailing master. As they took another labored step, she used the force to help chase away her exhaustion and boost her strength. She also fed some of the energy into the long dormant padawan-master bond she had with Anakin to try to ease some of his difficulties. She allowed herself a small smile of relief as she felt him take a bit of his weight off of her, although he was still leaning heavily.

“We’re almost there, Master,” she said gently as they exited the crumbling temple. In front of them was Vader’s personalized TIE fighter. “What do you need to do?”

“Get inside… And seal,” Vader wheezed. “Super-oxygenated… air.”

“Alright,” she acknowledged and proceeded to help the armored being into the pilot’s chair. It was a struggle due to both of their weaning strength, but they eventually did. Ahsoka looked at the craft, but there was really only room for one. Reluctantly, she stepped down from the spacecraft. Vader’s hands trembled as he reached for the correct switches to close the hatch. From the outside, she could hear the rush of fresh oxygen to the cabin as it slowly made an oxygen-pure atmosphere inside. 

Vader’s eyes met her’s through the glass and she was startled to see the visible eye looking back at her staying at a steady blue. Slowly, without breaking eye contact, Vader reached back to the underside of his helmet. To her ever growing confusion and wonder, he slowly took the helmet off. As he slowly removed the respirator from in front of his mouth, she could not stop her eyes from widening in horror at the scared surface revealed beneath. Her master’s once wavy locks were gone, burned by some fire that had scared the tissue and hair follicles of his head so badly they had never grown back. His skin, normally pale by human standards, was now pasty white. While her species skin tone did not change due to the sun, she knew that the pigment in human skin could fade away without the rays. He had been in the suit long enough that it didn’t appear there was any pigment in his skin left.

As she met his eyes once more, his brows were drawn together in what she would have once called an expression of worry. Was he afraid of what she would think?

“Oh, Master,” she sighed. “What has been done to you?”

While she knew he couldn’t hear her inside the ship, she stepped forward and placed her hand on the glass. To her surprise, Vader also placed his hand against hers for a brief second before drawing back.

“ _ I must go _ ,” she heard in her head. She wasn’t sure why she would have expected Vader’s mental voice to reflect his current, modulated voice, but it was Anakin’s she heard.

“ _ I don’t want to leave you, Master _ ,” she replied.

“ _ You must. You have people waiting for you as I have for me _ .” His eyes flashed yellow at this statement and Ahsoka flinched back. 

“ _ Please, Master, don’t go back. You do not need to be lost in the darkness anymore _ .”

“ _ That is where you are wrong, young one. The darkness is all I have left _ .”

“ _ You have me! _ ” Ahsoka mentally cried, but she knew the battle was lost when the TIE fighter’s engines started. The craft began to draw away as she fell to her knees, sobbing like she hadn’t since Order 66 when she first thought her master was dead. Her head snapped up as she thought she caught one last mental message.

“ _ I’m counting on it, Snips _ ”

**Author's Note:**

> Did you guys enjoy?? I had a hard time writing this story. There were so may things I wanted them to say to each other and so little time! I really had to keep reminding myself they were in a collapsing temple...
> 
> Serious question that I would really like all of you to answer: would you like to see this turned into a full length story? I know it's popular in this fandom to have Luke/Leia/Padma/Obi-Wan help turn Vader back and take down the empire together, but Ahsoka rarely shows up in those stories and, when she does, she's normally secondary to the other characters. I would like to do my own twist on this type of story with Ahsoka as the main catalyst and staying that way because I think she has such a unique relationship with Anakin/Vader. Not to say that other main trilogy characters wouldn't show up, but I want it to focus on her and Vader. Would you guys be interested? Let me know!!
> 
> Till the next time,
> 
> Pointeofdance


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